


The Shadows Cutting Deeper

by Serja



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Fantasy, Gen, Literature, fan fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 16:20:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14856086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serja/pseuds/Serja
Summary: Scattered across time and space, what seemed like the end may become a new beginning for a time-lost scientist as the memories of what was left behind give the will and wherewithal to pull those broken pieces back together.





	The Shadows Cutting Deeper

**Author's Note:**

> Having recently played Undertale for the first time, I've found myself deeply enamored with its story and setting. As a bit of a warm-up from a two-year writing hiatus, I thought it'd be fun to try a little personal exercise of writing a what if scenario of the scientist escaping from the void using an alternate timeline from the story I'm working on, and this was the result of that experimentation. It's my first time writing the character but I'm rather fond of the Dadster version of the character I've seen, so I hope folks enjoy it. 
> 
> Also, this story uses the Aster font, which can be downloaded here: [New Aster Roman](http://fontsgeek.com/fonts/New-Aster-Roman/download)

Darkness.

Endless emptiness.

The void encompassed all things and yet was no thing in the same moment.

There was no time or space in this veritable vacuum, and thus anything inside it didn’t strictly exist, nor age. And yet inside this nullspace something dwelt, the product of an experiment gone wrong.

Amorphous in form, the mind of this lost individual remained keen and aware, watching the variegated timelines where this eternal expanse touched them at different points in their cycles. Some existed peacefully, the lives of monsters as idyllic as expected, sometimes even progressing thanks to the actions of a particular few. Others were rife with violence, the death and destruction wrought paining the entity deeply. Still more simply ceased, ended by a force only partially understood by the observer, a quiet keening that resonated with their soul in that brief moment of permadeath.

How long they had been there was irrelevant, for there was no clock that would have been able to mark such passing in this place, but long had the mind turned over the conundrum of exiting this nothingness to resume much more important matters. For all the knowledge this vantage granted, it was useless without the power to act.

More timelines played out their respective dramas under that watchful gaze, still more thoughts churning in response to their seemingly endless conundrum. And yet, the mere act of self awareness pulled the long shattered pieces of this being back to them across time and space, a perhaps painfully slow process, but vital nonetheless for the man who spoke in hands to reclaim his identity from the abyss.

Memories of the time before the accident rippled across his mind in out of sequence fragments, broken remnants of a once long and productive existence. Some were tinged with regret, and others with joy.

_A tiny, round-headed baby bones held in his arms for the first time, seeming so fragile yet full of life._

The flash of memory sent a jolt through his soul, a quiet keen for the recollection of that loss. _Sans. My little comedian._ If he had possessed a proper form his hand would have been most certainly clutching at his heart for the weight of that remembrance.

Seeing this little glimpse of his son only made witnessing a timeline where the normally jovial skeleton was forced to act in desperation to save something of what was his home only to die and have that timeline completely erased cut that much deeper, the darkness weighing even more heavily on the doctor’s soul. At the same time it spurred him further, the yearning to take part and _do_ something, _anything_ , drawing in those disseminated fragments back to himself, the nebulous being gradually taking on a familiar shape suspended in that endless void.

More memories crashed across his consciousness as this process of self reclamation was somehow sped up by this… determination. Yes, he knew that was what it was now. Perhaps not as strong as in a human’s soul, but there regardless. A possible side effect of his failed experiment, most likely. If it helped him escape this abyss then he would not hesitate to use it to nudge the cogs of fate into motion.

_A solved color cube, proudly presented by a lanky young skeleton for inspection to his father._

The recollection of that sweet child, so full of innocence and goodness was like a searing hot knife through the scientist’s soul, prompting an upwelling of sound in his heart and mind. _Oh, precious Papyrus… how could I ever forget your gentle soul?_ The upwelling of determination in the monster was almost painful, but those two crucial pieces seemed to click together something vital that brought the full power of his soul to bear to draw in the remainder of his essence together.

He knew he had form again, though it could not be felt in the normal way due to his environment. All the pieces of himself once more in place, it was time to find his timeline once again, or as he told himself, at least one where he could make a difference.

Information flooded over him as his mind reached out, searching the timelines. He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but trusted his instincts anyway, feeling his soul being tugged toward… _something_. 

_A quiet night on a grassy hilltop, gazing up at the ceiling stars, lying on his back with a young skeleton held in a gentle embrace to either side as the trio soaked in the ambience, the doctor answering the seemingly endless tumult of questions from the younger baby bones’ inquisitive mind._

The memory was familiar, but something about it drew the man to delve deeper into it, feeling a connection that went beyond mere reminiscence into something more tangible.

Following that connection led him to a specific timeline amidst the multitude of others sprawling out in every direction around him, drawing his sights down into a cozy home in the middle of a quiet, sleepy corner of Snowdin, the peaked roof and little decorations on the outside achingly familiar. His form was ephemeral still, his mind alone what was able to escape the void to at least partially intersect with this particular reality. It was night, the city especially dark as he moved unseen through the front door, a phantom simply phasing through matter that for him wasn’t quite there.

He paused just inside the living room, glancing around at the living space before crossing it, taking steps he knew he didn’t have to in so he could savor something familiar again. Climbing the stairs, he entered the first room, feeling that subtle tug most strongly from there. A glance to his left after moving through the door earned a spark of recognition from the scientist, quickly crossing the remaining distance to come kneel by Papyrus’ bed, a ghostly hand reaching out to caress the bare skull as it laid against its pillow.

Papyrus stirred softly at that spectral touch, mumbling something in his sleep before settling back down, but not before the touch offered the man a glimpse of his son’s dream: a reliving of the same memory that had tugged him to this particular timeline.

It earned a faint smile even as he stood once again to exit that bedroom and move all the way over to another bedroom, entering the same way as the other, the locked door hardly a deterrent given his incorporeal status. As expected, Sans was asleep on his bed, wrapped up in his bedding so thoroughly that it was obvious his slumber was not quite as untroubled as his sibling’s.

_Oh, Sans, what have you been through in my absence?_

A gentle caress was gifted, though he found the elder’s mind to be far more closed off to the casual brushing against and opted against a more forceful intrusion. A sidelong glance went to the self sustaining whirlwind in the corner, an idea brewing in the back of his mind even as he straightened and walked back out of the bedroom.

Descending the stairs and exiting the front door, purposeful strides took him around the back of the cozy home, finding a familiar door that he slipped through into foreboding darkness. It reminded him of his true current residence and the irony of this was not lost on the doctor even as he tried something he had not done in a very long time.

_Magic._

Every monster’s soul and by extension body was composed of this mystical substance, and while his body was not here, some hunch encouraged the skeletal scientist to make this attempt. Hands pressed together at his sternum, feeling his soul starting to vibrate in resonance with his concentration, a deep breath drawn in despite not needing it as eyes closed, the act simply aiding his concentration as he lifted the pressed palms upward and then spread them out in a fluid arc, purple particles radiating outward to coalesce into the shape of half a dozen skeletal hands.

Eyes opened to the familiar sight of those softly glowing shapes, feeling hope resonating within his chest as he sent one over to the lightswitch, bidding it to turn the fixture on.

Light flooded the small laboratory abruptly, illuminating the workbench and more importantly a machine in the far corner, covered in a dusty cloth. A couple of the hands are used to gently remove this covering, setting it aside on the floor, far enough away to not interfere with the next steps brewing within his mind even as he stepped over to examine the long disused equipment.

Familiar displays and dials received his attention, magical appendages directed with a fervent purpose that brought that mysterious machine whirring to life, drawing hungrily on the magical electricity being fed to it all the way from the Core. It’s enough to make the lights in the room flicker oddly, using up much of the power in Snowdin as it began to create a portal much like the one that ended the scientist’s existence in the first place, with one key exception:

This one would finally bring him home.

The oblong portal swirled violently as it formed, creating a frenetic breeze through the workshop that ruffled papers and the discarded covering, threatening to create a small tornado of the lighter items in the room. He couldn’t spare the hands to pin any of the items down more properly, so he simply remained focused on the work at hand, flashbacks of that fateful night threading a cold note through his being. _I will not fail this time,_ he told himself even as he keyed in the final sequences, having had a very long time to consider what went wrong and how to rectify it.

With those final few adjustments the wind whipping around the room went suddenly still, the portal opening fully into that familiar abyss from which no photon readings could be obtained. The lights in the room and throughout much of Snowdin went abruptly dim as the machine consumed a significant amount of power to maintain that stable wormhole, prompting the skeleton to act with alacrity. Those magical hands reached into the abyss, reclaiming that which was once cast across all of time and space, a familiar figure emerging from that portal, soul and body reuniting once more in the realm of matter even as the portal began to degrade, the necessary power simply not there to keep it stable.

With an almost strange weightiness to his actions, the doctor reached over to turn off the machine, its purpose now fulfilled. The chromatic portal fizzled out of existence, allowing the lights to return to their normal state once more, momentarily unpleasantly bright to the man as he stepped off the pedestal and onto the tile, the soft tap of his soles echoing in his ear-holes as the reality of the situation asserted itself upon him. Hands were lifted up and turned over, digits flexed as he realized he was wearing the same outfit he had that fateful night, almost as if he had never left. Delight danced through him, sudden purpose moving his feet toward the door to exit the workshop.

W. D. Gaster was finally home.


End file.
